Number 1283: Captain Daring's “gay courage and grim justice”

Reed Crandall demonstrates once again how illustrative comic art was done. I'm not saying other artists didn't share the gift of how to draw, and draw comic books, but Crandall had some sort of special mojo. He could draw anything in the Quality Comics line, and with his Captain Daring feature the headliner of Buccaneers, showed that historicals were also well within his considerable artistic abilities.

Despite that, Buccaneers, where this story appeared in #22 (1950) didn't last for long. No comic book featuring pirates ever did, although attempts were made. Buccaneers, Pirates from Hillman, and Piracy from EC, for all their exotic trappings, just didn't have staying power. And it's kind of odd, too, because pirates have been a popular subject in other media, especially movies. Captain Daring himself is taken from Erroll Flynn in Captain Blood. Buccaneers should've had easy sailin' in the crowded comic book waters, but instead was scuttled and sunk.